Guide to Playing Rakan Mid
First shown in Weird Picks #86, Rakan Mid's been through a number of changes, most notably a large nerf followed by a large buff on his ultimate. Ever since the movespeed buff to his ultimate, Rakan's engage power is stronger than ever before and his potential to one-shot enemy champions remains as high as ever.
Guide to Playing Rakan Mid
First shown in Weird Picks #86, Rakan Mid's been through a number of changes, most notably a large nerf followed by a large buff on his ultimate. Ever since the movespeed buff to his ultimate, Rakan's engage power is stronger than ever before and his potential to one-shot enemy champions remains as high as ever.
Check out the details on runes and builds below!
How to Play Rakan Mid
Abilities: W, Q, E then prioritize R > W > E > Q
Summoner Spells:
Starting Items: Doran Ring + Health Potions
Strategy: All in as much as possible, but be sure to hit your heal for better trades. You can also pick up an extra point or two in Q early instead of maxing E right away if laning phase is longer than usual. Ionian Boots is more for the summoner spell reduction, but feel free to go Sorc.
Core Items: Hextech Protobelt-01, Ionian Boots, Luden's Echo, Void Staff, Deathcap, Zhonya's Hourglass
Summoner Spells:
Starting Items: Doran Ring + Health Potions
Strategy: All in as much as possible, but be sure to hit your heal for better trades. You can also pick up an extra point or two in Q early instead of maxing E right away if laning phase is longer than usual. Ionian Boots is more for the summoner spell reduction, but feel free to go Sorc.
Core Items: Hextech Protobelt-01, Ionian Boots, Luden's Echo, Void Staff, Deathcap, Zhonya's Hourglass
Rakan Mid Runes Setup
Primary: Electrocute, Sudden Impact, Eyeball Collection, Ultimate Hunter
Secondary: NImbus Cloak, Celerity
How It Works
Massive AOE Burst Damage
Rakan is an excellent engage support and packs a ton of crowd-control and damage, even when he's building full support items. With some AP however, he's capable of one-shotting enemy backlines while simultaneously dashing through front-lines. He also makes for an excellent secondary engage or disengage as a result of his E.
More Gap Closing Power
Building a Protobelt as a support doesn't make you any friends. Build it on an already hypermobile mid laner however, and you'll be dancing flashy circles around the entire enemy team. Adding in Protobelt to Rakan's already hypermobile combo allows him to initiate from completely off the screen, resulting in extremely difficult to anticipate engagements.
Amazing AP Ratios
Rakan's AP ratios are extremely good for a support with as much utility as he has. However, as a support, Rakan almost never gets to flaunt them. As an example, his passive shield has a 90% AP ratio, his Gleaming Quill [Q] heal has a 70% AP ratio, and his Battle Dance [E] has an 80% AP ratio. His offensive ratios aren't quite as good, but his defensive ratios allow him to out-trade the majority of lane opponents if he lands his spells.
Rakan is an excellent engage support and packs a ton of crowd-control and damage, even when he's building full support items. With some AP however, he's capable of one-shotting enemy backlines while simultaneously dashing through front-lines. He also makes for an excellent secondary engage or disengage as a result of his E.
More Gap Closing Power
Building a Protobelt as a support doesn't make you any friends. Build it on an already hypermobile mid laner however, and you'll be dancing flashy circles around the entire enemy team. Adding in Protobelt to Rakan's already hypermobile combo allows him to initiate from completely off the screen, resulting in extremely difficult to anticipate engagements.
Amazing AP Ratios
Rakan's AP ratios are extremely good for a support with as much utility as he has. However, as a support, Rakan almost never gets to flaunt them. As an example, his passive shield has a 90% AP ratio, his Gleaming Quill [Q] heal has a 70% AP ratio, and his Battle Dance [E] has an 80% AP ratio. His offensive ratios aren't quite as good, but his defensive ratios allow him to out-trade the majority of lane opponents if he lands his spells.
Potential Pitfalls
High Cooldowns
Most mid laners have either extremely high burst damage or low enough cooldowns that they can continuously dish it out. Instead of these, Rakan sports a kit that's good at all-ins but tends to struggle with waveclear or land heavy poke.
High Danger, Close Range Damage
As a mid-lane champion Rakan needs to consider his jungler's position and land his skills consistently. Without a target to jump to, Rakan loses out on an escape plan as his E doesn't allow him to jump to non-champion units.
Low Waveclear
Although his waveclear gets a big boost from Protobelt, Rakan's overall waveclear isn't that good as a result of his only AOE damage ability being the one that he needs to initiate and escape with. As a result, avoid playing him against a high waveclear champion or you'll have a bad time without some jungler assistance.
Most mid laners have either extremely high burst damage or low enough cooldowns that they can continuously dish it out. Instead of these, Rakan sports a kit that's good at all-ins but tends to struggle with waveclear or land heavy poke.
High Danger, Close Range Damage
As a mid-lane champion Rakan needs to consider his jungler's position and land his skills consistently. Without a target to jump to, Rakan loses out on an escape plan as his E doesn't allow him to jump to non-champion units.
Low Waveclear
Although his waveclear gets a big boost from Protobelt, Rakan's overall waveclear isn't that good as a result of his only AOE damage ability being the one that he needs to initiate and escape with. As a result, avoid playing him against a high waveclear champion or you'll have a bad time without some jungler assistance.
Countering Rakan Mid
Champions with strong instantaneous invulnerability like Fizz would do well against Rakan mid, but need to out-roam and out engage him.
Conclusions
Rakan Mid is a fun pick that's awesome if you can farm safely and/or get some early kills with his all-in. After an item or two he's extremely dangerous to backlines and his damage is comparable to almost any other assassin in the game. When you pair that up with his crowd-control he's a valuable asset to the team provided he isn't punished too hard during laning phase.
Suggested Tier: Tier 2
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